Friday, June 19, 2009

It's been so long

I apologize for the long long time of no blog entries. Those of you who know me understand completely I'm sure.

Lots of changes in the passed year but I won't bore you with that stuff:

For starters HG Productions is now doing business as Alstrin Films. Check out the new website. alstrinfilms.com We will keep this websit
e updated with the newest trips and video teasers.

Speaking of trips. I just got back from Namibia. Where the hell is Namibia you ask? That's the same question I asked when Majka Burhardt asked me to come along and film the expedition. Namibia is located just north of South Africa.

We spent three and a half weeks driving and climbing. More driving than climbing but that's the way things go sometimes. It was a very successful trip though. Our team consisted of Majka Burhardt, Kate Rutherford and Peter Doucette. The media circus on this trip consisted of Gabe Rogel - photographer and myself. You can view lots
more photos on Gabe's website. Click on recent trips - Namibia.

I flew into Windhoek, Namibia after 36 hours of traveling. I
immediately picked up my rental truck and started driving for 5 hours to our first climbing destination - Spitzkopp. Did I forget to mention I almost drove off the road twice by falling asleep at the wheel? Spitzkopp is an established climbing destination consisting mostly of bolted slab climbing. I met the crew, it was my first time meeting Kate and Gabe.

I'm not going to go too much into detail about the trip because it will be posted on Patagonia's Tinshed website in the fall. Look for it. I'll have a nice new trailer to watch on there as well.

I will say it was one of my better trips I have been on in a
while. I saw some amazing animals most of us only see in the zoo and spectacular scenery the type we see on National Geographic. I was able to film a first ascent climb on the highest peak in Namibia and walked by a tree full of African Killer bees and lived to tell about it. Ahhh yeah, but now I'm home and enjoying the garden, which by the way is doing good thanks for asking. In the mean time check out a very short clip of the climb they put up.